“I have never been there either,” Dick answered. “I only know that the Arlington is the largest hotel, and I shall go there for a few days at any rate, till I can look about.” He was glad for the company of the young cotton planter, for the only drawback to the journey so far had been want of suitable companionship. The captain and clerk of the boat and some of the swampers were good fellows in their way, but they and Dick had few interests in common. “If only I could have Darling or Jack Randall or some of the other fellows with me!” he often said to himself. “There are so many odd things to see; but it half-spoils the pleasure to have to see them alone.” Late in the afternoon Dick and the cotton planter were settled in good rooms in the Arlington Hotel, and before supper they went out to the broad front piazza together to see what they could of the town. While they sat there a brass band marched down the street, playing lively airs. “I wish they’d keep Mose Harrison in jail all the time,” one of the other guests said to Dick, “so the music would last.” “Who is Mose Harrison?” Dick asked; “and what has his being in jail to do with the music?” “Oh, you’ve just come, have you?” the man answered. “Well, you see Mose Harrison is the editor of The Daily Horseshoe, and he’s in jail for thirty days for libel. The jail’s down at the other end of town, and Mose’s friends have hired the band to go down there every evening and give him a serenade. He’ll be out in two or three days now.” “I think Mose Harrison is a man for me to meet!” Dick said to himself. Then turning to the planter he asked:-- “What do you think of Hot Springs, so far? Rather a lively place, isn’t it, where a prisoner in jail is serenaded every evening? There are more cowboys and sombreros and spurs in the streets than I ever saw before.” “It’s wonderful what a newspaper head Mr. Harding has!” he could not help thinking. “It looked to me like a dry subject, coming down the river into Arkansas to write letters. But the old man knew what he was about. This place alone is worth making the journey for. It is full of queer people from all over the Southwest, and it is sure to give me some good stories. The situation of the town is a novelty itself, lying here in a deep valley between two high mountains, the valley hardly five hundred feet wide. Then the hot springs boiling out of one of the mountains and the steaming water running off in a steaming creek through the main street.”